Catch You When You Fall
by Frakme
Summary: Mycroft contemplates the events of the Fall. Mycroft Holmes & Sherlock Holmes, sibling angst. Post Reichenbach, kid!lock, Part One of "A Song for the Lovers".


Mycroft Holmes, aged twelve, watched his little brother Sherlock, slowly climb the frame, with baited breath.

The five year old seemed to have no fear and sometimes Mycroft thought he must be one hundred and twelve the way his baby brother aged him through his exploits.

He approached the frame, heart in his mouth, warring between the urge to shout for Sherlock to get down, knowing he would only laugh and ignore him, or keeping silent and staying where he was so he wouldn't distract him.

He did neither, sighing softly and positioning himself close to the frame, never taking his eyes off the small, slight figure with the wild curly black hair that always seemed to be full of twigs and leaves. So thin and delicate he appeared, that his older brother feared an errant wind might blow him away.

"Look at me, My!" Sherlock looked down, letting go of the frame to wave down at his brother.

"Stupid boy, hold on!" Mycroft burst out, his heart beating rapidly. Idiot child, he thought, resentfully. Instead of ploughing through Winston Churchill's biography in his nook, with a plate of Mummy's fresh made shortbread, he was outside on a unpleasantly damp October day, trying to will his brother not to fall and break his neck.

Daddy was working, of course and Mummy was busy with her Church committee, or maybe the Women's Institute, knitting gloves for the homeless. Or was it preparing her Christmas cakes for the Christmas fayre? Whatever it was, once again it was left to Mycroft to look after his little brother, whose energy seemed boundless, as was his capacity for getting into scrapes.

Where as Mycroft preferred to bury himself in books, particularly history books (the gorier, the better), Sherlock roamed restlessly, poking his nose and fingers into everyone's business, searching for bugs of all kinds in the garden and worst of all, bringing in half decomposed birds and vermin he found in his wanderings. Then of course his fascination with climbing to the highest heights, with all the fearlessness only a five year old could have.

At last Sherlock reached the top.

"I made it! See, you thought I couldn't do it."

"Yes, yes, now come down, I want to go home now," replied Mycroft, testily. He watched as Sherlock scrambled down the frame. He was about half way down, perhaps six feet off the ground when the thing that Mycroft was dreading, happened. Sherlock's foot slipped and his hands lost their grip on the frame. He shrieked as he fell.

Mycroft didn't even need to think; his arms reached out and grabbed the little boy before he hit the ground, falling to his knees as he did so. He held the trembling boy tightly as Sherlock buried his face in his brother's neck, gripping his short, dark auburn hair.

Eventually he had to put the five year old down, he was getting heavy for even a stoutly built twelve year old such as Mycroft.

Shaken after his fright, Sherlock docilely let his brother lead him home by the hand, though the fright didn't stop him from clambering up and walking along a low wall on the way home, though he didn't once release Mycroft's hand.

* * *

><p>At bedtime, Mycroft read Sherlock a story about pirates, treasure and man eating sharks, their parents out at their bridge club, then tucking him in the blankets and kissing his forehead.<p>

"My, you'd never let me fall, would you?" said a small, sleepy voice.

"No, brother mine, I'd always catch you."

* * *

><p>Mycroft watches the CCTV over and over again. He has on it repeat, losing track of how many times he has watched it. Watching his baby brother jumping off the roof of St. Barts, his coat and scarf flapping in the breeze. A glass of single malt from Ardbeg sits untouched on the desk next to his hand.<p>

The plan has worked at least; he knows Sherlock is safe and on his way out of London, but the bitterness remains that he has helped drive Sherlock to this point, drove him to fake his own death, to appear to commit suicide in front of his one and only friend.

Eventually he switches it off, he is expecting Sherlock to call from the safe house near Heathrow soon, to check the arrangements that have been made for his new identity which will allow him to begin the task of dismantling Moriarty's web.

"I caught you, brother mine," he says softly. "But I wish I could've stopped you fall."


End file.
